LITTLE ROCK — The heavily attended Movies in the Park - the summer series of free outdoor movies at the Riverfest Amphitheatre on Wednesday evenings - is in full swing.
Next week, you can watch number-crunching baseball drama Moneyball with Brad Pitt, and, on July 11, Steven Spielberg’s bone-crunching thriller Jaws. If you haven’t had enough vampires on the big screen, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse will induce screams from hordes of ’tweens on July 18 and, on July 25, Bill Murray is set to tickle your gopher in the classic golf comedy CaddyShack.
The season finale Aug. 1 will be the popular kids’ classic Annie, based on the Broadway musical that was based on the comic strip that was based on a true story. (OK, that last part is totally made up.)
The shows always begin at sunset. You can get the full schedule of films and dates at the website moviesintheparklr.net or by joining the Facebook group Movies in the Park Little Rock. Oh, and if you go, take bug spray.
Just when you thought you had enough going on this summer, the 48 Hour Film Project comes back to Little Rock to steal one of your weekends.
Yours truly is hosting it this year under the aegis of the Little Rock Film Festival. And if last year’s record-setting enrollment is any indication, you might want to sign up ASAP.
If you’re not familiar with “The 48” (as past participants refer to it), the idea is that anybody can form a team and register to compete in making a film from scratch in just 48 hours (or two days if that sounds better). Teams must follow a set of rules and include specified elements in their film such as a line of dialogue, character or prop. Films are usually between five and eight minutes long and may be about nearly any subject as long as it works within what you choose from the various project’s genres - comedy, drama, Western, family, or even musical!
The project begins the night of Friday, Aug. 17, with filmmakers drawing their genres and getting the rules. They must complete every aspect of their film - writing, acting, shooting, editing, scoring - by 7 p.m. on the 19th. The films will be screened Aug. 22-24 at the Argenta Community Theater in North Little Rock, with an award ceremony and best-of screening the following week.
Registration for the event began Tuesday and there is a special discount early-bird rate of $140 through Saturday; then the regular $160 rate kicks in. Late registration begins Aug. 8 and costs $175. To sign up or get more information, go to 48hourfilm.com/littlerock.
Levi Agee is a programmer for the Little Rock Film Festival. E-mail him at:
MovieStyle, Pages 33 on 06/22/2012